Chapter 25 #2
Thia frowned. Those were not the words of someone who no longer cared. “Do you…” She cleared her throat. “Do you remember what it was like before you were cursed?” Remembering their rules, she added, “You don’t have to answer. I’m asking outside of the game.”
She braced herself for another angry retort, but Oskaren surprised her again. “I remember that I was happy.” Longing was evident in her voice. “But I don’t remember what that feels like.”
Oskaren’s attention was fixed to the forest floor, her thick brows quirked upward in the middle so she really did seem younger.
Thia searched for words, wondering what help she could give her, if there even was anything.
She deserved to remember, even if she couldn’t feel it now.
“Happiness is…it’s warmth here,” she began, hovering her hand over the girl’s sternum.
When she didn’t move away, Thia closed the rest of the distance.
A little zing of electricity went through her as her palm made contact.
Oskaren stilled immediately. Her skin was cool under Thia’s, but smooth over the curve of her bones. She could feel the girl’s heartbeat through the pads of her fingers, her thumb resting just above the curve of flesh that disappeared under her band of cloth.
Thia’s own pulse raced. “It’s…” She looked everywhere but where her hand lay.
“It’s like everything in the world is right, even when it’s not.
Things don’t need to be perfect to make sense.
And your mind is at peace.” Only after speaking it, did she realize how rarely she felt that way.
Anxiety. Stress. Fatigue. The consequences of constant fleeing for her life here in Eldris, but undeniably present even before she’d fallen into this miserable land, as she contorted herself into the shape of her mother.
A mother who didn’t even exist, when the real one had abandoned her in pursuit of magic.
Then it hit her. That version of her mother didn’t exist. She’d wondered what it would be like to go back to her old life, to pursuits that had been born of a deep yearning to know her roots, when the very foundation for them was gone.
But when was the last time those pursuits had actually made her happy?
Maybe now, untethered from the shadow of her mother, she’d have a chance to find out.
For the first time, some of her anger at Grandma Winnie relented.
Yes, she had lied, and that wasn’t okay.
But she was also there to comfort Thia in the trials that lie had wrought, with late-night snacks when she was studying too hard, rides to school before she’d had her own car, and hugs when she was crumbling.
She’d done the one thing Melina hadn’t: she’d stayed.
Oskaren spoke again, drawing Thia from her musings. “Happiness must be impossible. Has your mind ever known peace?”
Thia dropped her hand. Of course Oskaren would turn her moment of vulnerability into a jab. She raised her chin, stung, but—
Oskaren was smiling. Not like her usual smirk; it was genuine, sweet despite its mischief, and her entire face softened. Like the one she’d thought she’d caught a glimpse of the other day.
Thia paused, perplexed. “Was that a—a joke?” A real one, not an insult disguised as humor. She sputtered, an amused sound that was as equally embarrassed as it was pleased. “Alright, Ren.” The nickname suited this jovial side of the girl, a reminder of the heart she’d once had.
Oskaren’s pupils shrank, then grew, then shrank again, and Thia stopped laughing, hands flying to the girl’s shoulders. “Oskaren?”
When the girl met her eyes again, they were clear, clearer than they’d ever been. “Say it again,” she whispered.
Thia swallowed. “Ren.”
Oskaren’s breath stalled, and she moved closer. “Thia,” she said, and her voice was entirely different, rich, warm, kind, and even hopeful, with not a hint of bitterness.
“Ren?” Thia asked incredulously, wonderingly.
But then suddenly Oskaren cried out, her hands clutching her chest, face contorting with pain. She doubled over, hair falling to obscure her expression, lungs heaving.
Thia put a tentative hand on the back of her head. “Ren?” she said hesitantly.
Oskaren stared at the ground. “I suppose I have nicknamed you, too, Faelyn,” she said coldly. “It is only fair that you should do the same.”
She frowned. “Oskaren?” Her hand slipped down to the girl’s arm.
Oskaren yanked herself out of reach. “Don’t touch me,” she growled.
Thia recoiled, hurt.
Oskaren stood, expression harsh. “It was only a game,” she said, then turned on her heel.
“W-wait,” Thia called. “Your arm—” She scrambled for the strips of cloths inside the pouch and held them up. “It needs to be bandaged.”
Oskaren ignored her, scooping up her shirt and stomping away until she found a tree far enough away that they couldn’t speak, but Thia remained in view.
Thia watched her slump down against it. What the hell was that? She turned over possibilities, sorted through past exchanges, searching for patterns.
Because something had just happened, she was sure of it. Oskaren had been herself for a moment—the self Sorscha had described, the girl she’d been before the curse.
She dared a few steps closer and set the bandages down atop the pouch, hoping to tempt Oskaren to wrap herself, then moved away to find her own tree.
It had happened before. Perhaps not so obviously, but enough that their interactions snagged in her mind. And now that she was looking for it, Thia was sure there were times when they had conversed that the girl had softened, only to flinch away in pain.
Heartless people can’t feel.
Oskaren was cursed, that Thia believed. But what the curse was exactly, she was no longer sure. Because nothing about that girl was heartless.